Andy Burnham's social care pledge follows 13 years of broken politicial promises: Trevor Lyttleton

Andy Burnham has promised to reform social care and build a caring society. That commitment is warmly welcomed, but it comes with a warning drawn from 13 years of promises made and broken.

For more than 60 years I have campaigned against the loneliness and neglect of older people.

On October 18, 2013, I welcomed on ITV Jeremy Hunt's declaration the previous day that their neglect was "a source of national shame". In almost 50 years as founder and chairman of Contact the Elderly, it was the first time I had heard a government publicly acknowledge the scale of the crisis.

I hoped those words would mark the beginning of lasting reform but they did not.

In 2014 I declared a State of Emergency over elderly loneliness, warning that millions of older people were unsupported and off the radar.

Later that year an Early Day Motion, signed by 91 MPs, backed my campaign and called for greater action. Yet comprehensive social care reform still failed to materialise.

Jeremy Hunt remained Health Secretary for almost five more years without delivering the reform his alarm call demanded.

The human cost became impossible to ignore.

On 21 January 2018, The Times, Daily Express and The Independent reported that a million older people had been "left starving through loneliness."

Theresa May promised to fix social care "in our lifetimes" but no lasting settlement followed.

When social care was omitted from the Queen's Speech, I called him to account in a leading letter to The Times on May 13, 2021.

During the pandemic, around 20,000 hospital patients were discharged into infected care homes under a government policy later ruled unlawful by the High Court.

Had Jeremy Hunt's warning in 2013 been matched by action, Britain might have entered the pandemic with a far stronger social care system, enabling many more older people to remain safely in their own homes.

On November 13, 2022, Jeremy Hunt had a second opportunity to act, this time as Chancellor. I challenged him on BBC One's Sunday with Laura Kuenssberg, reminding him that nine years earlier he had described the neglect of older people as "a source of national shame." Once again, reform was postponed.

Following the 2024 General Election, Labour also postponed comprehensive reform. Andy Burnham now has the opportunity that successive governments have failed to seize.

After 60 years campaigning against elderly loneliness, I conclude that the first priority must be those who are frail, living alone and least able to navigate today's assessment and means-testing system. Helping them remain safely in their own homes would reduce loneliness, ease pressure on the NHS and delay the need for residential care.

Jeremy Hunt recognised a national shame in 2013. Thirteen years later it remains unresolved. Andy Burnham now has the opportunity to succeed where others have failed and finally turn recognition into action. If not now, when?

Trevor Lyttleton MBE is founder and chairman of Contact the Elderly (now Re-engage)